The computer has changed college. Today, I found out that English professors at the University of California restrict the fonts and their sizes so that a three page paper cannot magicaly change into a four page paper. It seems to me that creating and enforcing those kinds of restrictions takes time away from teaching english. It also invites legalistic arguments that have nothing to do with the subject matter. To the current college students, which system would you prefer: 1) a detailed list of restrictions which you must follow. or 2) "You are supposed to be a collge student. [size=+2]F [/size]" written on papers submitted in too large a font. To put it another way, do you prefer following detailed instructions or being expected to act like a serious student?
I think (from the professor's pov) that a standard font and size is good. It's easier to read when all 150 papers are the same type.
i agree with sugrmag. It is easier to read however many papers if they're all the same typeface. And there are some truly annoying fonts out there. But i've never had a paper assigned by page length yet. Always by word count. And the Prof's will say, such and such font, usually Times New Roman. but 've never heard of someone failing for using a bad font.
I'm teaching a college composition course. I suggest Times New Roman, but I don't have a problem if students submit material with similarly easy-to-read fonts. I ask for a certain point size, but I've never seen essays submitted that are very far off of that. Students can be very legalistic on their own. I've given instructions where I assume that students will act like serious college students, and students come back with legalistic questions. I've spent up to 15 minutes explaining what I want in some detail only to be asked immediately afterward, "What do you want on this paper?" I think it's impossible to satisfy everyone.
I've had papers turned in with 14 pt font, or some odd font that is equivalent to about 14-16 pt. Times New roman, and with 1.5 " margins... When you've got a stack of 50 pages, I don't see how anyone would expect that not to stand out... If you don't give a list of restrictions, how can you assume that someone else has done so? I feel it is only responsible teaching to specify 12pt font, 1" margins, etc. (or do by wordcount, but how are you going to realistically enforce that if they're turning in hard copies). I don't see what is so oppressive about adding a short list of specifications in the syllabus (especially since you are already specifying the number of pages you want). THEN, if they don't follow the instructions on the syllabus, you can make the comment you suggest on option #2... Of course, if you're trying to teach english, I don't see how that will be the least bit constructive...
My point was that a college student should know when they are tweaking the system..trying to get away with something..going for the grade rather than the knowledge... As Sage Dreamer noted, this trend started with the students. I am concerned that the youth of today values rules too highly. They are more confortable following instructions than making their own choices. I could go on, but..(8 paragraph rant about society training the youth to conformity.) Thanks for the feed back.
don't make these "restrictions" such a big deal. there are standards that everyone should use when submitting academic work--12pt font, double-space, etc... learning them takes all of about 10 seconds and shouldn't interfere in any way with one's education....
You're right most of the time... A few of the mishaps are due to them not paying attention to default settings -- a good paper should have 1" margins all around, but Word's default is 1.25", you'd be surprised how much difference that can make in text length... But, as for the majority who know they are trying to get away with something... Part of the way the university system as I know it (dunno about small liberal arts colleges) is that you're required to take a certain number of general education classes. That means that pretty much everyone HAS to sit through a certain number of classes that they don't really care about. It's just part of the game (and some of y'all can argue about whether you really need a university to become educated, but for many of us that piece of paper is important, especially if you want to go on to an advanced degree)... So you take a stupid class that fills some requirement that is quite distant from your area of interest because that's what allows you to spend most of your time focusing on that topic that you really do care about. Or, you're a freshman taking classes to see what you like, and you get half way through the semester before you realize this subject is not as interesting as you thought it would be... In which case, you do what you gotta do to get through with a decent grade and with the gained knowledge that you never want to go near that topic again. Those are the cases where I tend to see people trying to get one over -- it's not the majors, definitely not upper level majors. Those who I see doing this are the chemistry or pre-med or british literature or whatever students who are only taking an anthropology class to fulfill the social sciences requirement. So we can critique the approach of going for the grade instead of the knowledge, but it is an outgrowth of the set-up of the system -- which, frankly, I see as an overall positive, because it forces students to at least gain exposure to different viewpoints.
I think these restrictions are useful in a way. When there were no computers, professors would probably turn down badly handwritten stuff, because it was so hard to read. Same would go for funky hard to read or oversized fonts. A prof may have to read 50 papers with 50 pages (hell even 20 would be much). How can anybody expect him/her to decryptofy every single paper? Minimal Form "violations" should not be punished. I mean Times or Arial, there's barely a difference, or size 14 or 12.... Just minor things. But dearteachernormal, and times is a huge difference, and submitting academic work in such a font is more then ridiculous. These people seriously need to think about whether college is the right place for them.
hah I go to one and they never enforce that rule. I use 13 instead of 12 all the time when I need an extra few lines
that's what i see...and not only at (high) school. there are tons of people at my school who worry more about how long their paper is supposed to be, rather than what they want to say about the topic. and too many kids i've talked to actually believe cannabis must be bad because it's illegal.
lol very good double example novictimnocrime. both so true. people worrying SO MUCH about paper length - it's the content that matters. and in response to the other half of the example, it's actually really amazing how few people at university are open-minded to weed - most people will give this really arrogant look to you if you're like "yeah, i smoke". maybe i just haven't met the right people yet.
Then don't follow the damn restrictions. I don't care, as long as you don't cry to me when they fail you're lazy ass.
Yes, it's the content that matters. But the page length tells you how much content to provide. If I come across a 10 page paper with about 6 pages worth of content and the rest is BS, it's not getting a good grade. If I come across a paper that is a couple of pages over because the person is that excited about the topic, fine. At the same time, conciseness is an important skill too -- being able to fit ALL that cool stuff into just x number of pages, when you could write twice as much, is not easy!
I think that the restrictions can be good or bad depending on the case in which they're used. For example, I'm taking a creative writing class and for our final portfolio we have to submit a short story; 12 pt. font, 1" margins and 10-12 pages. I think this is a little absurd because it's fiction. I've read amazing short stories that were very well developed in only 2-3 pages, but there are others which may require 20 pages. So I'm struggling with limiting myself on that. But on the other hand, in classes on literary theory, I have had professors who enforce all of those requirements and insist on an essay being no more than 1 page, which is very challenging. This can be an incredibly usefull skill, though. To be able to present a clear, concise argument in a short amount of space can make a great impact. This is especially true when you carry these skills outside of the academic world where many people don't want to pour over pages and pages of text; they just want you to get to the point and explain it quickly. So I think when presenting arguments, having the restrictions can be very valuable, but in a more creative piece of work, they are completely unnecessary.
I agree that restrictions can make you a more flexible writer, although I never thought about it this way until today. We actually had a discussion about that in my writting class this morning, and the teacher said that was her goal. I thought that was a cool way to look at it! I also agree that some people care way too much about the length of a paper than what they say. In fact, I'd been working on a paper that had to be 725-750 words, but I only used 721. I most likely could added something--but I did not feel I could fit anything else in the paper that would fit. I said all I wanted to say about the subject, and it was pretty close to the limit! About font restrictions, lengths etc, another way to think of it is as preparing people for the world of work. I know it's a sucky idea, but realistically, a boss is likely to give you specifications for a project, which you will have to work within. Perhaps you'll have some leeway, or maybe not. Learning to work within different limits will make you more flexible, and it will be easier to do such projects.
I teach English composition, and I'm reasonably flexible about requirements. I assign word counts because my department tells me to do so. Our semester ended a few weeks ago, and my students were assigned a final paper that was supposed to be approximately 1500 words long and used at least five sources. There were more than 40 students in my classes, so you can understand why I wouldn't count all of the words in all of the essays. That would be 60,000 words to count in addition to reading the essays and grading them and calculating final grades. A paper that is substantially shorter than 1500 words is going to stand out from the others. I put a + sign in the margin whenever a student makes a good point, uses a good thesis statement or has a particularly interesting or helpful piece of evidence to support a point. A short paper has fewer opportunities to get a + sign in the margin. One of my students turned in a paper that was about 700 words long and used three sources. This student did not get a passing grade. Students were also required to come to weekly one-on-one conferences. I talked with students about their thesis statements, made recommendations about sources, helped them work through their ideas and so on. The student who turned in the short paper only showed up for one conference out of the three conferences.
Sage, you sound like an excelent teacher! I find conferences to be a very helpful way to find out exactly what the teacher wants, so I as a student, can get when I want: the best possible grade! The English department gives you guidelines off which you create your assigments? Is this true of all colleges?
